Robert Boris Movies
John Buechler's horror film Ice Crawlers begins with a team of scientists getting information in the Arctic. Their actions awaken some nasty creatures that have been lying dormant for centuries. Now, they are hunting the scientists down one at a time. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Götz Otto, Alexandra Kamp, (more)
The wild and colorful world of backyard wrestling provides the backdrop for this action comedy. Cole (Scott Hamm) and Lee (Walter Emanuel Jones) are two close friends who love professional wrestling and hope to make it onto the pro circuit themselves some day. Everybody has to start somewhere, and Cole and Lee soon become involved in the underground world of amateur backyard wrestling, in which grappling hopefuls do body slams and piledrivers next to the picnic table or the storage shed. Cole and Lee start making a name for themselves among backyard wrestling fans, and they soon begin working with aspiring manager Kristy (Bree Turner), a smart and sexy girl who soon makes Cole and Lee the talk of the Internet. But as Cole and Lee's star rises, they discover a lot more fighters are interested in taking them down a few notches, and the competition only gets tougher as they become more successful. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Scott Hamm, Walter Emanuel Jones, (more)
In this action thriller, Steve Mitchell (Peter Weller) is an American agent sent to Bucharest to defuse a bomb located in the U.S. embassy. He's pleasantly surprised to find that Erica Long (Daryl Hannah), his colleague and former girlfriend, will be his assistant for this project, but the fun part of the reunion is cut short when Serbian terrorists attack the embassy and take most of the staff hostage. While Steve and Erica manage to escape, Steve's 14-year-old son is still inside, and he must find a way to get him out before Gen. Buck Swain (Tom Berenger), who was once a schoolmate of the terrorist leader, executes his raid to liberate the embassy, which could prove bloody. Enemy Of My Enemy manages to season its traditional action scenario with moments of dry humor and a dash of romance. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Weller, Daryl Hannah, (more)
Rob Lowe and Bill Paxton star as Frank and Jesse James, who, after the defeat of the South in the Civil War and the pointless murder of their younger brother, seek their own brand of justice. As outlaws, they gain fame for their daring hold-ups of banks, trains, and stagecoaches -- and make sworn enemies of lawmen, who are determined to see them dead. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rob Lowe, Bill Paxton, (more)
- 1988
- R
After he is framed by his senior partner and sent to jail, Herbie Altman Robert Carradine sets up a lucrative investment company "Con Inc." with the assistance of the other convicts, sympathetic guards, and a well-intentioned prison reformer Lise Cutter. Lame, predictable story which wastes a talanted cast . ~ All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Carradine, Michael Winslow, (more)
- 1987
- R
An alcoholic Vietnam vet who has lost both his wife and his job as a cop while struggling to adjust to civilian life in southern California heads out for unintentionally hilarious revenge against the newly immigrated Vietnamese drug lord who slaughtered his best friend and his family in this campy "Rambo-esque" actioner. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
The "wise guys" referred to in the title, Harry Valentini (Danny DeVito) and Moe Dickstein (Joe Piscopo), turn out to be not so wise after all in this crime-oriented comedy. Harry and Moe run the risk of certain death when they steal money from a Mafia don (Dan Hedaya) and then try to multiply their ill-gotten gains at the horse races. Naturally, they lose the bundle and the next thing they know they're running from hitmen and trying to come up with enough cash to pay back their debt. Wise Guys' blend of comedy and action represented something of a change of pace for director Brian DePalma, best known for his offbeat thrillers and Hitchcock homages. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Danny DeVito, Joe Piscopo, (more)
Honeymooners stars Jackie Gleason and Art Carney re-team for this tea-teetotaling comedy about a pair of down-on-their-luck vaudeville actors who go to work as prohibition agents. The time is the Roaring Twenties, and the advent of the motion picture has made vaudeville old news. When the stage lights dim, actors Isadore Einstein and Morris Smith are forced to consider another line of work. Now, in order to keep food on the table and help halt crime, Isadore and Morris begin using their unique penchant for disguise to bust the local speakeasies and stop the mob from ruling the streets. Unfortunately for Isadore and Morris, the mob isn't willing to loosen their grip on the lucrative alcohol trade quite so easily, and the duo soon finds themselves targeted by some of the meanest criminals that the underworld has to offer. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- 1984
- PG13
This is an uneven modern remake of A Yank at Oxford (1938) from writer-director Robert Boris, the man behind such diverse earlier productions as Some Kind of Hero (1981) and Doctor Detroit (1983). Rob Lowe stars as Nick Di Angelo, an American hustler and parking attendant in Las Vegas who falls in love at first sight with a beautiful, classy British woman, Lady Victoria (Amanda Pays). He follows her back to England and learns that she is a student at the prestigious Oxford University. Intent on wooing the object of his affection despite their obviously different locations in the social strata, Nick manages to finagle his way into an admission at the school by paying a computer hacker for some illegal tampering. With his arrogant manner and self-centered worldview, Nick quickly offends nearly everyone he encounters, except fellow American expatriate Rona (Ally Sheedy), who becomes his only friend. Nick also secures a spot on the rowing team, an experience that builds his character. A typical example of the mid-'80s "Rat Pack" film, Oxford Blues featured a soundtrack with several forgettable rock songs written expressly for the movie, interjected at intervals into the narrative through music video-style sequences. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rob Lowe, Ally Sheedy, (more)
- 1983
Blood Feud was a two-part TV drama, originally presented as an "Operation Prime Time" special. Robert Blake is disturbingly convincing as labor leader Jimmy Hoffa, engaged in a decade-long war of words with attorney (and later attorney general) Robert F. Kennedy. Cotter Smith makes his TV debut as Kennedy, a role he'd repeat on future occasions. Thoroughly compelling when sticking to the facts, the drama falls apart whenever indulging in flight of fanciful speculation (Sample: two of Hoffa's lieutenants watch the live telecast of Lee Harvey Oswald's murder, then celebrate the fact that Oswald will never be able to reveal their complicity in the JFK assassination!) Blood Feud was syndicated to local TV stations beginning April 24, 1983. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Blake, Cotter Smith, (more)
A college professor (Dan Aykroyd is forced to go undercover as a Chicago pimp disguised by a bushy wig -- the height of hairlarity in this anemic comedy. When Smooth Walker (Howard Hesseman) is hunted by his gangster rival, Mom (Kate Murtagh), he foists his bevy of hookers on the professor -- and then ends up dead. Among the four hookers who are suddenly in his undercover life are Fran Drescher in an early role as an archetypal Jewish princess, and Donna Dixon as another of the high-class call-girls (Dixon and Aykroyd were later married). ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dan Aykroyd, Howard Hesseman, (more)
- 1982
In this exciting aerial actioner, a young woman convinces her ex-boy friend, who used to fly a chopper in Vietnam, to help her out. The airborne special effects are particularly effective. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
Richard Pryor gives a compelling performance in Some Kind of Hero, playing a Vietnam veteran who tries to readjust to civilian life. Pryor plays Eddie Keller, who has just spent five years in a North Vietnamese prisoner-of-war camp. Most of the time there, Eddie was able to hold his own against his captors, but he eventually was forced to sign a statement denouncing United States involvement in the Vietnam War. Eddie decided to sign the document in order to insure that his friend Vinnie (Ray Sharkey) would be given proper medical treatment. Because of this denunciation, when Eddie returns home from the war he is denied his back pay. He also discovers that his wife has left him for another man, his business has fallen apart, and his mother has been sent to an asylum. Eddie falls into a deep depression and hits rock bottom. But he meets a friendly prostitute, Toni (Margot Kidder), who helps him straighten out his life. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Pryor, Margot Kidder, (more)
- 1973
Harry Walker (David Janssen) is a helicopter traffic reporter in Salt Lake City who's never quite gotten over the time he spent flying during World War II -- a former combat pilot, he sees the world passing him by amid complacency and his own life reduced to boredom and bittersweet nostalgia for the best of times, when he was working for a cause that mattered (and there were causes that mattered). He chances on a brutal armored car robbery and helps the police give chase, and suddenly finds himself in the thick of the action when the robbers -- who have taken a woman hostage -- switch from a getaway car to a chopper. And when the getaway chopper tries to ram him, that's all it takes to get Walker into a cross-country aerial pursuit into the Utah desert in a duel to the death. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
A police officer who would rather use his brains than his gun is put into a situation where neither can help him in this police drama. John Wintergreen (Robert Blake) is a sawed-off and street-smart Arizona motorcycle cop who dreams of climbing the ladder and becoming a police detective, but his ambitions are scoffed at by his partner, Zipper (Billy "Green" Bush). Wintergreen's superiors tend not to take him seriously due to his short stature, but when he stumbles upon the site of a murder, he digs up enough relevant evidence to insure his advancement to detective status. However, after a few days on the job, Wintergreen begins to realize just how corrupt his superior Poole (Mitchell Ryan) truly is after Poole attempts to frame a local hippie, Bob Zemko (Peter Cetera), for a crime he didn't commit. Adding fuel to the fire is Poole's discovery that he and Wintergreen have been dating the same woman, dancer-turned-barmaid Jolene (Jeannine Riley). Electra Glide in Blue was the first (and to date only) directorial credit for James William Guercio. Successful in the music industry as a manager and producer, Guercio was best known for his association with the top-selling jazz-rock group Chicago; several members of the band appear in the movie, as does a young Nick Nolte in a bit part. On a note of sad irony, Terry Kath, the longtime Chicago vocalist who died in 1978 from a self-inflicted gunshot to the head, plays a gun-wielding killer in this film. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Blake, Billy Green Bush, (more)
